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COLLECTION 


A.   MESSAGE 

TO  THE 

WORLD 

by-  BOUCK   WHITE 


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\  FTER  the  Ludlow  massacre,  Bouck  White,  preacher  of 
rA  the  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution,  wrote  to  the  pastor 
of  the  Rockefeller  Baptist  Church,  suggesting  that  a  joint 
meeting  of  the  two  congregations  to  discuss  the  matter  from 
he  standpoint  of  Jesus,  might  remedy  our  social  afflictions.  He 
tated  that  he  would  visit  the  Rockefeller  Church  the  following 
5unday  to  extend  to  them  this  invitation.  Receiving  no  reply, 
iouck  White  went  to  that  Church  as  announced,  and  at  the 
ime  for  "notices,"  he  arose  to  convey  the  invitation.  It  was 
ound  then  that  the  congregation  was  thickly  strewn  with  plain 
lothes  men  and  police.    He  said :  "As  the  pastor  of  a  neighbor- 

ng  church,  I  am  come "     But  he  got  no  further.     He  was 

eized  by  the  officers,  cast  into  jail,  and  sentenced  to  six  months 
)n  Blackwell's  Island.     Privilege  of  appeal  was  denied  him. 

He  sent  this  manuscript  out  from  the  prison  and  had  no 
hance  to  correct  the  mutilated  passages.  Its  timeliness  will 
nore  than  atone  for  the  type  errors. 


CALL    OF    THE   CARPENTER 

By  BOUCK  WHITE 

A  Few  Passages  from  the  Book 

*</^^  HRISTIANITY  needs  to  get  a  new  set  of  words.     The  charge 

y^^  is  brought  against  the  social  democracy  that  it  is  an  inflamer 
of  the  masses.  But  the  masses  need  to  be  inflamed.  To  be 
set  aflame — is  not  that  quite  the  divinest  thing  that  can  happen  to 
a  man?  Prometheus  was  the  saviour  tj'pe  because  he  was  the  fire- 
bringer.  And  Jesus  showed  his  .'•aviourhood  nowhere  more  con- 
vincingly than  in  his  manifesto:  ''I  am  come  to  bring  Are  on  the 
earth."  The  Carpenter  of  Nazareth  has  redeemed  the  toiling  masses 
from  contempt.  Conceived  from  an  ancestry  of  immemorial  toil, 
gestated  amid  the  swirl  of  coming  despotism,  born  in  a  stable,  suckled 
in  straits  and  poverty,  he  knew  the  sorrows  of  the  disinherited.  A 
free  workinsman  compelled  to  compete  with  slave  labor,  he  ate  the 
bread  of  afHiction  and  drank  the  cup  of  servitude.  He  lifted  up  his 
voice  against  the  industrial  oppression;  therefore  he  was  led  to  the 
slaughter.  Golgotha  has  added  a  rouge  to  the  banner  of  democracy. 
It  has  put  a  crimson  girdle  about  the  earth,  to  bind  all  workers  into 
one." 

"The  Carpenter  of  Nazareth  is  Democracy's  chief  asset;  to  sufifer 
themselves  to  be  defrauded  of  him  were  criminal  negligence.  He  is 
the  greatest  arouser  of  the  masses  which  human  annals  have  recorded. 
He   'stirreth   up  the   people'   is   his  biography  in   five   words." — Page   305. 

"The  Jews  are  going  to  rediscover  Jesus.  They  are  the  foremost 
among  the  agitators  for  a  new  social  order.  With  Protestantism  wor- 
shipping a  Jew,  and  Romanism  worshipping  a  Jewess,  Israel  is  not 
going  to  be  defrauded  much  longer  of  its  heritage  in  Mary  of  Nazareth 
and  the  Carpenter." — Page  313. 

"The  cross  that  topped  Calvary's  hill,  and  the  Workingman  there 
lingeringly  put  to  death,  typed  the  lot  that  has  been  meted  out  to 
the  wage-class  through  the  long  historic  story.  For  labor  likewise  has 
known  the  wormwood  and  the  gall;  of  it,  too,  is  recorded  a  'descent 
into  hell'."— Page  351. 

"Democracy  is  not  perfect,  but  it  is  the  least  imperfect  thing  that 
the  human  race  has  thus  far  produced.  Its  faults  are  the  shadows  cast 
by  a  morning  sun,  and  will  grow  less." — Page  355. 

The  Carpenter  and  the  Rich  Man 

(Companion    Botok  to  THE  CALL  OF  THE  CARPENTER) 
CHAPTER  HEADINGS 

I.     The  Immorality  of  Being  Rich.  XI.     A  Good  Mixer. 

II.      Strong-Blooded.  XII.     The  Mental  Universe. 

III.  The   Imbecility   of   Being   a    Mil-  XIII.     Deep  Foundations  for  the  Social 

lionaire.  Faith. 

IV.  Why   Did   Jesus   Commend    Con-  XIV.     The  Grandeur  of  Man. 

fiscation.  X\ .  The     Utility     of     Historic     Con- 

V.     The   Curse  of  Small  Men  in  Big  tinuity. 

Places.  XVI.  The   Wrath    of   a   High   Hearted 

\J.     Class-Consciousness.  Craftsman. 

\  II.      .\  Plunger.  XVII  The    Good    Time   Coming. 

VIII.     The  Middle-Class.  XVIII.  God  Incognito. 

IX.     The      Importance      of  Worldly           XIX.  Fast  Gathering  Storm. 

Wisdom.  XX.  The    Meek,    Preparing   to    Inherit 

X.     Fellowship.  the  Earth. 


CHURCH  OF  THE 
SOCIAL  REVOLUTION 


CHURCH 


OF   THE 


SOCIAL  REVOLUTION 


A  Message  to  the  World 

BY 

BOUCK  WHITE 


Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

publishers 

42  washington  square.  south 

new  york  city 


Copyright,  1914, 

BY 

BOUCK    WHITE 


Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 


A  MESSAGE  TO  THE  WORLD 

The  nowaday  world  is  a  topsy-turvydom.  That 
is  on  top  which  ought  to  be  at  the  bottom.  And 
that  is  at  the  bottom  which  ought  to  be  at  the  top. 
The  objective  of  the  Revolution  Church  is  to  turn 
the  world  upside  down.  To  the  end  that  it  may 
go  thereafter  right  side  up. 

DREAMERS  OF  THE  DREAM 

Unto  that  holy  task  hand  joins  in  hand.  Tough- 
minded  visionaries;  they  that  are  full  of  dreams 
every  minute;  all  forward-looking  folk;  they  into 
whose  ear  the  miseries  of  our  day  speak  loudly; 
these  we  are  wooing.    Such  are  invited  to  our  colors. 

You  that  crave  reality;  you  that  have  distaste 
of  an  age  of  shams  and  make-believe,  come.  You 
belong  to  us.    We  belong  to  you. 

You  that  have  no  heart  to  this  soggy  and  soft 
generation;  wishing  your  days  under  the  sun  to  be 

5 

785540 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

lived  dangerously,  in  the  hazard  of  a  high  adventure, 
come.    You  belong  to  us.    We  belong  to  you. 

You  that  cry  after  beauty,  and  would  establish 
grace  upon  earth  in  the  stead  of  this  drab  and  very 
commonplace  age  that  now  is,  come.  You  belong 
to  us.    We  belong  to  you. 

You  that  set  this  present  evil  family  and  its 
maxims  at  nought;  you  that  endure  the  gaff,  re- 
sisting ten  thousands  of  people ;  you  that  can  stand 
for  the  truth  when  the  truth  is  unpopular,  come. 
You  belong  to  us.     We  belong  to  you. 

You  whose  eyes  gush  with  tears  because  of  the 
world's  bloodmadness,  whereby  nation  is  slung 
against  nation  and  the  people  are  cannon  fodder, 
come.    You  belong  to  us.    We  belong  to  you. 

You  discern  the  might  which  is  darkening  down 
upon  the  world,  and  would  set  up  a  standard  to 
which  the  wise  and  the  believing  and  the  valorous 
may  repair,  come.  You  belong  to  us.  We  belong 
to  you. 

A  CONTRABAND  CAUSE 

Here  at  the  start-off,  we  tell  you  that  ours  is 
a  dangerous  and  contraband  cause. 

Therefore  if  you  are  of  the  fainthearted,  the 
6 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

unspirited  sort,  come  not.  You  belong  not  to  us. 
Nor  we  to  you. 

If  slippers  and  the  chimney  corner  are  to  your 
taste ; 

If  you  understand  life  in  terms  of  comfort  and 
sordid  indulgence; 

If  you  would  that  all  men  should  speak  well  of 
you; 

If  jibes,  and  the  assembly  of  the  mockers,  turn 
your  face  into  paleness; 

If  the  prospect  of  prison  bars  gives  you  weak- 
ness of  knees ; 

If  you  deem  life,  with  slave  status,  rather  to  be 
chosen  than  death  and  the  company  of  the  free- 
born — 

Then  come  not.  Turn  your  back  to  us  and  not 
the  face.    You  are  not  of  us.    We  are  not  of  you. 

IN  FELON  STRIPES 

Which  is  more  than  talk  of  the  lips.  He  who 
pens  this  is  in  a  prison  cell.  The  judge  in  passing 
sentence  pronounced  me  a  dangerous  man;  though 
I  am  of  a  wholesome  tongue,  and  have  offended 
against  the  law  neither  of  God  nor  man. 

For  stirring  up  the  people  am  I  here.     I  have 

7 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

cried  against  the  decline  in  freedom — money's  grow- 
ing might,  chain's  riveting  around  man's  mind  and 
spirit.  Therefore,  the  prison  gate  swings  wide  for 
me.  And  there  are  bars  over  the  window  toward 
which  I  strain  my  gaze. 

Furthermore  this  wath  of  Wall  Street  promises 
to  grow  more  grievous  against  us.  The  Revolution 
Church  is  a  youngling.  Her  bones  and  sinews  have 
not  come  into  their  strength.  If  felon  garb  is  our 
portion  whilest  we  are  but  a  babe,  what  indignation 
of  the  world's  anger  will  flame  against  us  when 
years  have  wrought  their  work  and  we  are  come 
to  fulness  of  stature? 

The  situation  is  going  to  be  ever  more  tensely 
drawn.  The  masters  will  be  cruel  when  their  fear 
comes.  Trouble  is  near.  Let  softlings  refrain  their 
feet  from  this  path.  Along  it  golgothas  are  scat- 
tered. 

Christians,  with  fine  naivete,  are  highly  content 
with  a  plan  of  salvation  that  includes  a  cross — 
provided  the  crucifixion  will  be  done  for  them  by 
proxy.  We  are  drilling  in  the  people  a  different 
doctrine.  By  your  own  blood  shall  you  be  saved, 
is  our  creed.  No  coward  shall  enter  the  kingdom 
of  heaven. 

8 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

THE  MATERIALIST  ROOT  OF  HISTORY 

For  long,  the  churches  of  the  Respectability 
have  had  their  martyrdoms  done  for  them  vicari- 
ously. They  have  besung  the  bloody  sands  of  the 
colisseum.  And  in  heroic  strain  have  vaunted :  "I'll 
die  at  my  post."  Now,  in  the  social  war  of  liber- 
ation, the  opportunity  is  offered. 

All  the  martyrdoms  of  all  time  have  had  their 
root  in  economics.  The  issue  was  not  called  by 
that  name.  The  economic  was  commonly  overlaid 
with  an  obscuring  growth  of  theologies.  But  under- 
neath it  all,  lay  that  trinity  of  unescapables :  food, 
clothing  and  a  roof. 

The  materialistic  interpretation  of  history,  some 
call  it.  Stumble  not  at  the  phrase.  It  translates  a 
truth.  It  neither  bereaves  the  race  of  its  halo, 
nor  degrades  the  story  of  the  past  into  chronicles 
of  a  pigsty  and  the  kennel.  To  declare  that  eco- 
nomics have  been  the  substructure  of  all  history, 
leaves  the  superstructure  unassailed.  And  of  fair 
etherial  stuff  has  that  superstructure  been  consti- 
tuted: of  religion  and  poetry  and  science.  The 
pleasant  arts,  all  that  decorates  and  polishes  our  life, 
have  bloomed  out  of  a  bread-and-butter  base  work, 
as  a  blossom  out  of  dirt.     The  economic  is  the 

9 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

matrix,  in  whose  fecundating  warmth  all  the  spirit- 
ualities have  had  their  germination. 

Once  again,  in  this  tumultuous  day,  a  fire  that 
will  search  and  try  the  souls  of  men  is  kindling. 
Combustible  materials  are  heaping  up.  Wealth  and 
poverty  are  sundering  one  from  the  other — inequal- 
ity ever  more  steep ;  a  contrast  more  and  still  more 
discordant. 

Which  condition  is  portentous  of  either  slavery 
or  revolution.  Wealth  is  the  measure  of  a  man's 
ownership  of  his  fellows.  Spell  it  in  other  terms 
as  you  will,  it  doggedly  comes  back  to  this — domi- 
nation over  human  beings.  Much  money  places  into 
a  man's  hand  much  mastership.  The  rich  rule  over 
the  poor;  and  the  borrower  is  slave  to  the  lender. 
Distinctly  the  great  fortunes  of  to-day  are  an  in- 
vasion of  popular  sovereignty.  Under  the  forms 
of  freedom,  an  unseen  empire  is  cementing  itself, 
enemy  to  democratic  liberties.  Living  at  ease  from 
their  youth,  and  with  the  multitude  under  tribute 
to  them,  great  lords  have  grown  fat  as  a  heifer  at 
grass. 

Shall  these  things  be?  The  churches  of  the  Re- 
spectability answer  with  a  very  quick  Yes.  Peace- 
and-Quietness  is  their  divinity;  who  is  very  fulmi- 

10 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

iiating  and  wrathful  against  social  rebellion.  With 
the  laudanum  of  their  liturgies  they  cast  the  revolt 
of  your  soul  into  a  deep  sleep. 

OUR  DIVINE  ONE  DANGEROUS 

But  I  say  unto  you,  their  deity  is  not.  There  is 
no  god  but  our  god.  Democracy  is  his  dwelling 
place.  Stirrer-up-of-the-people  is  his  name.  Where- 
soever a  populace  is  in  ferment ;  where  the  multitude 
is  yeasty,  where  eyes  are  alight  and  tongues  are  in- 
terrogative— there  is  very  good ;  sworn  foe  of  stag- 
nancy, creator  of  folk  upheavals. 

The  true  god  is  god  of  fellowship,  and  is  a 
mighty  terrible  one  against  them  that  drive  down 
the  poor!  A  dangerous  manifesto,  that.  It  is  a 
word  charged  with  high  explosive.  Hot  seed  of 
revolution  is  in  it ;  turnings  and  overturnings. 
Where  god  goes,  man  soon  or  late  will  follow. 
When  the  multitudes  learn  that  the  Most  High  is 
not  with  the  luxurious  but  with  the  laboring,  they 
will  arise  out  of  their  sleep,  and  will  cast  the  re- 
pressor from  off  the  face  of  the  earth. 

Not  marvellous,  therefore,  that  we  have  incur- 
red a  strong  wrath  of  the  privileged  ones,  soft, 
abundant  in  treasure.     They  seek  to  stop  us  with 

II 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

gates  and  bars.  But  the  teaching  we  inculcate  upon 
the  people  is  true.  And  shall  be  shouted.  Danger? 
Man's  job  is  to  blab  truth,  let  the  danger  be  what 
it  will.  Heaven  will  conduct  the  affair  to  a  good 
end.  Democracy  is  god's  middle  name.  Our  soul 
announces  it,  experienct  reveals  it,  history  confirms 
it. 

Democracy,  whose  slow  pageant  across  the  time- 
field  is  the  life  story  of  the  Eternal. 

THE  REASONABLENESS  OF  REVOLUTION 

Let  not  the  word  revolution  make  you  afraid. 

Revolution  is  normal,  when  the  river  gathers  it- 
self for  a  plunge,  and  generates  thereby  a  power 
not  procured  in  streams  of  a  placid  and  even  de- 
scent. Both  evolution  and  revolution  are  heaven's 
way  of  getting  mankind  forward.  Ordinarily  man 
can  keep  step  with  god  by  evolution's  steady  walk- 
pace.  But  there  come  times  when  the  Great  Com- 
panion gets  so  far  ahead  that  mankind  has  to  run  in 
order  to  catch  up ;  historians  call  it  revolution.  Rev- 
olution is  evolution  hurried  up.  Ever,  the  inertia 
of  the  human  mind  is  heaven's  sorest  problem. 

Such  a  hurry-up  call  is  sounding  to-day.  In  the 
space  of  one  packed  and  crowded  century,  a  millen- 

12 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

nium's  worth  of  discovery  and  invention  and  power 
has  taken  place.  Machine  production,  science  and 
its  dominion  over  the  elements,  a  freshly  added  em- 
piry  of  knowledge,  have  brought  to  pass  a  new 
heaven.  A  new  earth  to  go  with  that  new  heaven, 
must  now  be.  God  is  thinking  in  terms  of  the 
twentieth  century.  Man — sloth  that  he  is,  and  al- 
ways has  been ;  a  natural-born  loafer  in  things  of  the 
mind — is  back  in  the  seventeenth  century.  Between 
them,  a  three-hundred-year's  gap!  The  Revolution 
Church  is  god's  call  to  men  to  make  strides  and 
catch  up  with  him  once  more.  Enormously  in  our 
day  has  the  world  increased  in  material  power. 
But  it  has  not  increased  in  moral  power. 

To  many  "revolution"  signifies  blood.  So  that 
when  they  hear  the  word  a  horror  of  great  darkness 
gets  hold  upon  them.  Well,  brother,  even  if  it 
meant  blood,  it  were  not  so  sanguinary  as  the  pres- 
ent order.  Not  five  thousand  lives  were  abolished 
by  the  Terrorists  of  '93.  Moralists  hold  up  horri- 
fied hands  at  the  eyed  fury  of  it.  The  War  of  the 
Nine  Nations,  that  does  now  incarnadine  the  world, 
takes  that  toll  of  life  in  half  a  day.  The  blood 
spilled  in  all  the  social  revolutions  since  the  world 

13 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

began,  equals  not  the  flow  of  life's  red  liquor  in 
one  battle  under  so-termed  Christian  civilization. 

But  I  hasten  to  retract  even  the  seeming  con- 
cession. Blood  and  revolution  are  not  predestined 
mates.  Indeed,  to  safeguard  the  present  crisis  from 
blood-guiltiness  is  the  purpose  unto  which  the 
Church  of  the  Social  Revolution  is  risen.  Not  that 
we  are  softeners ;  or  seek  to  dampen  the  fire  of  re- 
volt in  one  human  breast.  We  are  valiant  for  free- 
dom. We  enflame  man's  cold  and  sodden  spirit,  a 
spirit  too  slow  to  wrath  against  the  repressions  that 
despoil  him.  But  in  externalizing  that  wrath  into 
action,  the  ballot  is  the  weapon  we  employ.  We 
proclaim  the  powerlessness  of  violence.  We  exalt 
strength  rather  than  force.  Precisely  to  bring  about 
an  arbitrament  by  brains  and  not  by  blood,  is  the 
mission  for  which  we  have  been  born.  A  red  revo- 
lution within  is  our  platform.  And  the  life  religious 
is  the  tone  and  the  temper  of  our  doings — religion, 
that  alchemy  wherewith  Cromwell  transmuted  re- 
belliousness into  an  ordered  and  passionate  lib- 
eralism. 

A  beneficent  and  structural  work,  this.  We  in- 
vite you  to  lay  your  hand  in  ours,  to  teach  wisdom 
to  a  troubled  age  and  restore  health  to  mankind. 

14 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

Have  you  education  and  cultivated  powers?  Here 
you  may  invest  them  with  highest  usury ;  organizing 
the  social  discontent,  that  the  flow  of  its  energies 
may  be  according  to  law  and  custom.  Revolutions 
go  wild,  because  the  people  of  elevated  culture, 
superrefined,  draw  aside  from  the  multitude,  thus 
leaving  it  to  the  leadership  of  minds  that  are  undis- 
ciplined and  overwrought.  To  cast  in  your  lot 
among  those  to  whom  you  can  give  the  most,  is  the 
divine  way ;  and  makes  for  stature.  To  cast  in  your 
lot  among  those  from  whom  you  can  receive  the 
most  is  the  human  way;  and  belittles  men  into 
pygmies. 

THE   BLOOD-GUILTINESS   OF   BUSINESS 

The  slaughter  sin  now  destroying  Europe  is  the 
beginning  of  the  end  of  the  present  order.  A  won- 
derful and  a  horrible  thing  is  being  committed : 
The  strong  man  has  stumbled  against  the  strong 
man.  Blood  is  poured  out  by  the  force  of  the 
bayonet.  It  spatters  on  the  herb  of  every  field. 
And  the  carcasses  of  men  are  for  dung  upon  the 
face  of  the  earth. 

But  be  instructed,  O  man!  Military  tactics  are 
not  one  whit  more  flesh-hungry  than  are  business 

IS 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

tactics.  Competitive  guns  stand  in  close  kinship 
with  competitive  goods.  They  were  twinned  in  the 
same  womb.  Greed  sired  them.  And  that  damned 
hag  Overreach  mothered  them. 

Business  to-day  is  based  on  the  survival  of  the 
brutalest.  It  throttles  the  god  in  man;  lets  the  ape 
and  tiger  flourish.  Blessed  is  the  hyena-hearted. 
Woe,  the  man  whose  conscience  is  quick,  whose 
sympathies  are  tender.  It  is  an  inverted  evolution, 
slaying  the  souls  that  should  live,  and  saving  the 
souls  alive  that  ought  to  die.  Thus  to  organize 
life  on  a  principle  of  force,  and  expect  that  force  to 
function  in  the  business  realm  only,  with  never  a 
short-circuiting  of  it  in  mad  military  doings,  were 
as  sagacious  as  would  be  to  admit  bubonic  plague  in 
a  city  with  expectation  to  quarantine  it  in  a  cau- 
tiously circumscribed  area. 

Commercial  cut-throating  and  military  throat- 
cuttings  are  children  of  one  and  the  same  spirit. 
Take  from  me  the  prop  whereby  I  sustain  life,  you 
take  my  life.  Shylock  phrased  it  truly.  A  people 
that  consents  to  price-cut  their  neighbor  into  a  nation 
of  bankrupts  will,  with  the  same  lustihood,  can- 
nonade them  into  a  nation  of  widows.    To  bombard 

i6 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

a  man's  credit,  is  of  like  nature  with  bombarding 
a  city. 

The  world's  murder-madness  is  to  many  an  as- 
tonishment. Looking  upon  the  inferno  of  fire,  they 
are  ready  to  declare  earth  a  candidate  for  the  crazy 
house ;  wholesale  incinerators  for  the  slain  in  battle ! 
That  men  in  this  day  should  cause  their  sons  to  pass 
through  a  modern  moloch!  But  I  say  unto  you, 
economic  sin  wounds  more  grievously  than  shrapnel. 
Had  people  imagination,  they  would  see  our  com- 
petitive civilization  to  be  one  battlefield  of  mangled 
forms,  writhing  trunks,  scattered  arms  and  legs — 
all  the  human  debris  of  battle.  To  buy  in  the  cheap- 
est market,  brother,  and  sell  in  the  dearest,  is  war; 
let  the  codes  call  it  what  they  will.  Commercial 
war  terminates  as  certainly  in  militarist  war  as  a 
tiger's  cub  grows  into  a  man-eater  when  the  years 
have  wrought  their  ripening  work. 

We  of  the  red  host  international  shall  make  a 
full  end  of  war  by  establishing  fellowship,  not  only 
between  competitive  frontiers,  but  also  between 
competitive  factories.  We  are  growing  a  new  heart 
in  man.  You  shall  not  do  war  away,  till  you  have 
done  competition  away.  When  merchant  marines 
are  in  rivalry,  iron-clads  and  submarines  are  the  irre- 

17 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

pressible  consequence.  Embattled  shopkeepers  make 
embattled  nations,  though  Hague  palaces  uprear  in 
every  city  and  the  people  with  prayers  for  peace 
bombard  the  pearly  gates  off  their  hinges. 

INQUIRE  IN  OUR  TEMPLE 

It  was  not  of  chance  that  the  Church  of  the 
Social  Revolution  was  set  up  in  the  year  of  Europe's 
catastrophic  event.  Our  soul  told  us  that  mighty 
things  were  impending,  and  that  the  depths  were 
about  to  break  up.  We  looked  forth  on  a  darkening 
world.  Competition,  sanctified  by  a  pseudo-chris- 
tianity,  was  putting  enmity  and  yet  more  enmity 
between  the  people  of  earth.  With  inflammables 
thus  heaping  up,  the  flame  could  not  tarry  to  leap 
forth. 

In  a  day  of  blood  and  darkness,  our  Church  has 
come  to  birth.  As  the  old  order  passes,  we  have 
engaged  our  hearts  to  build  the  new,  the  divine 
order.  Already,  hearts  that  intensely  desire  a 
change,  are  multiplying.  And  their  number  will 
finely  augment  when  the  conflagration  shall  have 
brought  the  wealth  and  art  of  a  thousand  years  to 
ashes.  Let  the  maddened  victims  awake,  with 
hunger  looking  in  upon  them,   they  will  establish 

i8 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

a  judgment  day  for  the  perpetrators  thereof.  When 
households  shall  have  been  brought  to  a  piece  of 
bread,  when  the  slain  shall  have  been  counted,  In- 
terrogation will  arise  like  a  strong  man  armed.  And 
there  will  be  a  noise  of  falling  thrones — doom  of 
dynasties  and  of  all  that  oppress  the  poor.  Our 
Church  has  set  herself  to  construct  new  ideals  for 
the  world,  a  new  outlook  upon  the  universe,  a  new 
way  of  understanding  life.  To  the  end  that  man- 
kind may  not  be  naked  when  it  steps  forth  from  its 
blood-path;  but  may  have  a  vesture  of  brighter  hue, 
and  patterned  on  a  new  design. 

A  year  ago,  "Church  of  the  Social  Revolution" 
would  have  jarred  the  sensibilities  of  men.  They 
would  have  accounted  us  folk  of  a  wicked  and  sedi- 
tion mind;  sappers  and  miners.  But  now  to  sober 
and  responsible  spirits,  revolution  is  a  serious  medi- 
tation. The  climacteric  doings  in  Europe  are  teach- 
ing people  to  think  ultimate  thoughts,  talk  in  terms 
of  fundamental  cataclysmic  change. 

People  are  beginning  to  glimpse  the  nature  of 
the  present  order,  an  order  proceeding  from  evil 
to  evil.  And  minds  now  are  willing  to  consider  a 
basic  transmutation  in  the  world's  life,  that  would 

19 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

have  stamped  such  dreamings  a  twelve-month  ago 
as  the  rabid  phantasies  of  a  brain  unhinged. 

TO  THE  SOCIALIST  PARTY 

The  Church  of  the  Revolution  takes  from  So- 
cialism the  reproach  of  anti-religion  so  pertinace- 
ously  brought  against  it ;  and  makes  it  at  last  the 
full-orbed  ideal  that  shall  conquer  the  allegiance  of 
mankind.  Always,  religion  is  a  flaming  flame.  It 
intensifies  whatsoever  it  touches.  No  conservatism 
like  a  religiously-buttressed  conservatism.  Con- 
trariwise, radicalism  when  married  to  religion  is  of 
a  tenacity  that  no  shock  of  adverse  circumstance 
can  break.  Times  have  been  when  this  religio- 
radicalism  has  not  taken  counsel  of  wisdom.  As 
with  the  Anabaptists  coeval  with  Luther.  But  even 
there  the  fervor  lighted  up  a  city's  history  other- 
wise drab  and  dismal.  And  when,  as  in  Palestine 
of  the  scriptures,  we  find  the  explosive  combi- 
nation controlled  by  sound  minds  and  directed  to 
civic  ends,  it  has  proven  itself  the  most  beneficient 
force  that  ever  visited  mankind.  So  that  to  the 
story  of  it,  the  bible,  western  civilization  recurs 
daily  to  strengthen  the  well-springs  of  idealism. 

An  irreligious  Socialism  is  a  powerless  Social- 

20 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

ism.  Of  that  pattern  was  the  Party  in  Germany, 
And  its  stampeding  by  the  war  spirit  is  the  fruitful 
fateful  consequence.  True,  to  have  withstood  Prus- 
sia's military  clique  would  have  been  dangerous.  It 
is  not  comfortable  to  lose  one's  head  for  principle's 
sake.  But  the  coward  part  they  have  chosen  is 
proving  more  uncomfortable  still.  For  on  the  firing 
line  at  this  moment  many  hundreds  of  them,  by  ball 
and  bullet,  are  losing  their  heads.  All  the  pains  of 
martyrdom  are  theirs,  without  the  martyr's  recom- 
pense. The  death  they  are  dying  is  every  whit  as 
exquisite  in  agony  as  any  a  court-martial  could 
have  inflicted.  They  die  now  as  the  fool  dies. 
Their  last  conscious  moment  is  a  loathing  of  them- 
selves. And  they  are  buried  with  the  burial  of  an 
ass.  Comely  and  sweet  it  is  to  die  for  democracy. 
But  to  die  in  a  quarrel  of  dynasties — an  imbecile 
thing.  On  the  names  of  such  oblivion  feeds  fat. 
The  collapse  of  Germany's  Socialism  teaches  the 
high  cost  of  compromising.  "But,"  they  plead,  "we 
Socialists  are  only  human,  after  all;  we  were  over- 
borne by  the  warrior  environment."  The  excuse 
excuses  not.  Socialists  are  called  to  be  more  than 
human.  Always  the  social  redemption  has  waited 
on  the  coming  of   super-mortals.      Programs   are 

21 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

cheap.  A  high-school  brain  can  devise  programs. 
Power  to  will  and  to  do  the  program  is  the  world's 
premier  need.  They  alone  possess  that  power  who 
build  for  their  souls  a  habitation  in  supertime — old 
eternity  out  of  which  we  came,  and  unto  which  we 
are  returning;  and  .vhose  awful  sublimities  alone 
touch  our  little  day  into  grandeur.  They  who  perish 
for  the  cause  of  peace,  live  unto  everlastingness. 
Whilst  they  who  would  live,  by  consenting  to  war, 
die ;  and  are  dead  eternally. 

To  restore  to  Socialism  the  note  of  aspiration  is 
our  Church's  high  intent.  We  will  give  back  to  it 
the  god-power  it  has  lost.  Socialism  is  a  religion 
or  it  is  nothing.  Its  supply  base  is  not  in  kingdoms 
that  are  seen,  but  in  kingdoms  that  are  unseen.  It 
is  of  faith  and  immortality  all  compact.  From 
us  shall  go  forth  a  reborn  Socialism,  impassioned, 
and  marching  with  the  tread  of  a  conqueror.  Not 
that  our  Church  aims  at  political  power.  A  moral 
suzeranity  shall  be  ours.  We  are  covetous  of  eth- 
ical empire.  That  so  we  may  present  to  the  world 
a  Socialism  more  than  skin-deep.  A  Socialism  as 
big  as  the  universe;  reaching  down  to  the  cosmic 
core  of  things,  and  up  to  the  high  places  of  the 
Lord. 

22 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

TO  THE  ANARCHIST 

Anarchism,  when  something  other  than  a  fury 
of  demolition  against  existing  institutions,  is  the 
most  spiritual  idea  ever  born  among  men.  It  af- 
firms that  man  can  be  perfectly  controlled  from 
within.  He  needs  not  that  his  mouth  be  held  in 
with  bit  and  bridle,  like  the  horse  or  like  the  mule 
which  have  no  understanding. 

Then  come  with  us,  my  anarchist  brother,  and 
let  us  grow  the  governed-from-the-inside  man  you 
covet.  He  will  not  grow  of  himself.  Against  that 
complacent  creed,  modern  science  is  conclusive. 
Man's  native  state,  says  evolution,  is  total  depravity. 
In  his  unconverted  condition  he  is  a  creature  of  the 
wild.  The  ethics  of  the  jungle  are  the  ethics  of 
spoil  and  violence.  Rousseau  and  his  school  of 
nature  sentimentalists  are  a  derision  to  men  of 
science.  The  natural  man  is  of  the  brute,  brutish. 
And  must  be  born  again,  e're  he  can  be  free  from 
the  trammels  of  law  and  courts  and  jails  and  night- 
sticks. 

Order  and  discipline  is  not  a  weed  growing  ef- 
fortlessly. It  is  a  plant  of  long  cultivation.  Be- 
tween the  ape  and  the  man  standing  before  the  cage 
looking  in,  what  an  infinite  journey !    And  a  journey 

23 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

uphill,  every  step  of  it.  In  the  twilight  of  primeval 
forests,  man  came  to  stand  upright;  no  small  tri- 
umph, that.  Aeons  pass.  Man  fashions  a  tool  of 
stone.  Yet  more  aeons.  He  kindles  a  fire,  and 
comes  to  behold  in  that  flame  the  fixed  center  of  a 
home  and  a  household. 

Yes,  a  prodigious  climb,  for  man  to  reach  the 
heights  of  order  and  self-control.  Each  child  in  his 
life  career  recapitulates  this  upward  track  of  the 
race.  The  Revolution  Church  brings  men,  one  by 
one,  up  this  evolutionary  ascent.  We  forge  a  soul 
inside  him.  In  order  that  ruling  his  own  spirit  he 
may  tolerate  none  other  rulership.  Such  a  soul  will 
practice  Nihilism  on  a  civilization  of  whips  and 
chains;  on  all  exterior  expulsions  whatsoever.  But 
until  a  man  has  learned  thus  to  master  himself,  all 
powers  in  earth  and  hell  unite  to  master  him, 

TO  THE  I.  W.  W. 

My  fellow-worker  in  the  I.  W.  W.,  you  have 
no  use  for  the  intellectual  class.  With  set  purpose 
to  exclude  them,  was  your  name  chosen:  Industrial 
Workers  of  the  World.  "Only  Hand  Workers 
Wanted.  Brain  Workers  Need  Not  Apply."  And 
then   you   wonder   why   your   efforts   to   overturn 

24 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

society  meet  with  so  middling  a  success;  and  why 
you  are  a  disintegrating  mob,  fast  vanishing. 

Listen:  Never  yet  a  revolution  in  all  of  time's 
long  story,  but  the  intellectual  class  was  the  mover 
of  it,  and  the  chief  doer  of  it.  In  the  fifteenth 
century  it  defied  emperor  and  pope,  and  started  the 
modern  era.  In  England  it  cut  off  the  head  of 
Charles  I.  It  guillotined  Louis  XVI.  of  France. 
It  formed  the  Boston  Tea  Party.  And  in  '6i  freed 
the  chattel  slaves. 

The  book  education  you  afifect  to  despise — know 
you  not  that  libraries  are  so  charged  with  social 
explosives  that  the  time  is  like  to  come  when  their 
full  use  by  the  public  will  be  rescinded.  History 
is  thick  strewn  with  popular  upheavals.  Revolution 
is  not  a  recent  devising.  It  has  been  ever  of  old. 
Contemporary  with  the  soul  of  man,  it  outdates  the 
pyramids,  and  has  written  with  pen  of  iron  in  every 
language.  Where  men  groan  and  women  weep, 
revolution's  fire  has  kindled.  Think  you  a  man  is 
less  an  agitator  because  he  has  communed  with 
Byron  and  Shelley  and  Browning? 

Revolution  wrote  the  bible.  It  wrested  Magna 
Charta  from  slippery  King  John.  It  was  the  coal 
of  flame  whereat  the  tongues  of  a  Hampden  and 

25 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

Emmet  and  Patrick  Henry  were  touched  to  elo- 
quence. It  pinned  the  guns  at  Lexington.  Penned 
the  poetry  of  Emerson  and  Lowell.  Wrought 
valiantly  at  Harper's  Ferry. 

But  you  in  your  blindness  have  put  an  embargo 
on  the  past,  so  rich  in  radicalism's  fire  and  splen- 
dour. You  would  cut  ojfif  man's  rootage  in  the  by- 
gone. With  illiberal  spirit  you  have  been  jealous 
of  your  fellow-workers,  the  intellectuals.  And  then 
you  marvel  that  you  have  been  rejected  of  men;  and 
are  decreed  unto  disappearance. 

By  losing  yourself  in  the  Church  of  the  Social 
Revolution  you  will  find  yourself.  In  our  fold,  they 
that  work  with  their  heads  and  they  that  work  with 
their  hands  shall  be  equally  at  home.  We  know 
neither  occupation  nor  color  nor  race.  The  white- 
collared  laborer,  and  he  of  the  greasy  overalls,  in 
our  fellowship  are  side  by  side.  Earth  needs  them 
both.  Therefore  we  welcome  them  both.  The 
"A.  W.  W."— All  the  Workers  of  the  World— are 
we;  the  reintegration  of  the  dismembered  family 
of  toil.  Building  thus  generously,  we  conserve  those 
portions  of  yesterday  that  have  value.  Revolution 
raised  to  the  nth  power,  must  link,  however,  with 
the  long  succession  of  man's  heroism  in  the  past. 

26 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

Only  those  innovations  are  blest,  that  continue  the 
ancient  web  with  richer,   fairer  weavings. 

TO  THE  TRADE  UNIONIST 

You  of  the  trades  unions  are  the  aristocrats  of 
toil.  We  ask,  in  all  courtesy,  have  you  not  in  your 
heart  the  seeds  of  a  self-centerdness  quite  as  sordid 
as  any  master-class  ever  that  made  itself  great  by 
keeping  others  small?  You  cry  out  against  mo- 
nopoly. But  is  not  3^ours  a  monopoly-of-the-job, 
against  the  humbler,  the  mud-sill  toilers?  You  are 
the  front  rank  of  labor.  And  you  slam  the  door 
of  opportunity  in  the  faces  of  the  hindermost. 

You  think  to  be  practical  by  banning  from  your 
assemblies  aught  that  savors  of  aspiration;  the 
higher  ranges  of  the  soul.  "Revolution" — you  will 
have  none  of  the  word.  "To  sing  the  folk  upheaval 
and  grow  a  Socialism  of  the  heart" — sentimental- 
ism.  You  choose  not  to  meddle  with  "dreamers." 
Shorter  hours  and  a  wage  increase  bound  your 
horizon. 

O  fool,  fool,  fool !  The  trough  cannot  hold  all 
truth.  Your  boasted  practicality  has  brought  you 
into  saddest  impracticality.  You  have  shortened 
your  hours  by  one-tenth — and  the  boss  has  speeded 

27 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

up  your  machine  by  two-tenths.  You  have  gained  a 
twenty  per  cent,  increase  in  wages — and  the  owners 
have  worked  a  Hke  increase  in  your  living  expenses. 
Your  fine  agitatings  are  as  a  man  on  a  treadmill — 
you  walk  much  and  get  nowhere.  For  thirty  years 
now  has  trades-unionism  been.  And  the  distance 
between  you  and  the  owning-class  on  the  top — the 
social  gulf  that  separates  between — is  many  and 
many  times  wider  than  three  decades  ago. 

Moreover,  your  fate  is  altering  every  day  for 
the  worse.  Your  leaders  sell  you  out.  Your  ranks 
are  sundered  by  faction's  widening  breach.  Your 
solidarity  is  no  more.  An  evil  coterie  governs  you. 
The  soul  is  the  life.  When  the  soul  is  gone  out, 
the  body  bloats  into  corruption  and  a  swelling  black- 
ness. 

Not  thus  shall  you  win  to  your  goal.  Let  the 
labor  movement  cease  from  her  habitation  on  the 
heights  to  descend  into  self-seeking  and  material 
mindedness,  she  shall  go  despised  among  men.  The 
Revolution  Church  seeks  to  keep  her  upon  the  alti- 
tudes, where  repose  her  strength  and  her  safety. 
The  Lord  of  laborers  will  permit  in  his  toiler  host 
no  privileged  class.  We  all  must  win,  or  none.  You 
have  need  of  the  Galilean,  that  master  of  workman 

28 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

aJl.     Come  unto  him,  you  that  labor  and  are  heavy 
ladened.     He  will  give  you  the  Commonwealth. 

TO  THE  MIDDLE-CLASS 

You  wear  soft  raiment,  O  middle-class.  You 
are  tall-hatted  of  a  Sunday.  From  work  you  go 
home  to  your  six-rooms-and-a-bath.  You  tango 
one  night  in  the  week.  You  belong  to  a  bowling 
club.  You  certainly  are  a  somebody.  Or  on  the 
road  to  become  a  somebody. 

Know  you  not  that  you  are  furnishing  yourself 
to  go  into  captivity?  See  you  not  the  economic 
noose  that  is  preparing?  Above  you,  the  masters. 
Beneath,  the  unionized  laborers.  You  are  purposed 
to  be  a  neuter;  neither  hammer  nor  anvil.  So? 
Then  you  will  be  the  bauble  between,  afflicted  equally 
by  hammer  strokes  and  anvil  hardness.  Daily  your 
living  cost  mounts.  Daily  the  foundations  of  your 
income  weaken. 

You  are  brayed  as  in  a  mortar.  They  are  swal- 
lowing you  up  on  every  side.  Today  money  is  king. 
Your  share  of  the  world's  money  is  dwindling  every 
hour.  Lords  of  privilege  and  plenty  are  exalted 
over  you.  They  reduce  you  socially.  These  times 
are  your  toboggan.    Your  glory  is  departing.    Your 

29 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

soul  is  humbled  in  you.  On  a  falling  market  are 
your  boast  and  your  pride.  You  are  going  small 
among  the  people.  And  are  a  reproach  among  men. 
A  plumber  surpasses  you  in  pay.  And  vastly,  as  to 
security  of  position.  Yet  5'ou  account  yourself  of 
a  clay  remote.  You  will  not  own  that  your  bread 
is  buttered  on  the  same  side  with  his.  You  are 
loath  to  name  yourself  a  laborer.  You  draw  ask- 
ance from  the  blue  dickie.  You  wear  garments  of 
the  masterclass.  And  think  thereby  to  ingratiate 
yourself  into  the  polo-playing  set.  Earth  has  few 
sights  more  awe-inspiring,  than  the  middle  class 
when  it  goes  in  for  social  climbing. 

Money  and  Mrs.  Grundy  are  the  idols  unto  which 
you  have  lifted  up  your  eyes;  terrified  eyes,  and  sup- 
pHcating.  Unto  them  you  sacrifice  your  conscience, 
your  honor,  the  respect  of  your  soul,  and  the  ideal- 
isms of  your  youth.  For  trumpery  things  that  will 
not  give  you  joy,  you  barter  immortalities.  Your 
doings  are  customary  and  standardized.  Shall  such 
a  one  trail  clouds  of  glory  ? 

Each  day  visits  you  with  truths  that  would  stab 
you  home,  if  yours  was  a  mentality  given  to  think- 
ing. But  you  don't  think.  Your  masters  don't  wish 
you  to  think.    A  thinking  populace  is  a  bodeful  thing 

30 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

for  masters.  Therefore  they  provide  baseball  bulle- 
tins, that  you  may  shout  yourself  hoarse  and 
strengthen  yourself  in  the  drowsiness  of  your  spirit. 
The  masters  will  do  anything  under  the  heavens  of 
the  Lord  to  keep  you  from  thinking.  And  they  have 
succeeded.  Your  beastly  contentment  with  the  pres- 
ent order  proves  it.  You  are  cursed  above  all  cat- 
tle. Cattle  are  the  possesion  of  another;  and  know 
it  not.  You  are  the  possession  of  another;  and 
know  it  not.  You  are  not  ashamed.  Your  present 
is  dark.  Your  future  is  darker.  The  magnates 
play  battledore  with  you  for  the  shuttlecock.  And 
amid  it  all,  you  retain  the  insensibility  of  a  sixteenth 
century  peasant. 

From  this  mire  of  philistinism,  the  Revolution 
Church  comes  with  deliverance.  We  offer  you  par- 
ticipation in  an  unpopular  righteous  cause.  We  do 
not  promise  you  comfort  and  security.  We  prom- 
ise you  peril  and  hardness.  Always  to  be  safe,  is  to 
be  forever  damned.  Than  this,  a  more  pregnant 
time  never  was.  To  be  privileged  to  have  your  life- 
span in  this  so  wonderful  day,  makes  a  majestic 
summons  upon  thought  and  heart  and  energies.  In 
a  time  thus  big  with  fate,  will  you  sleep  a  perpetual 
sleep  and  return  into  the  ground? 

31 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

I>ay  your  hand  in  ours,  and  live.  The  Revo- 
lution Church  is  strong  to  create  immortals.  We 
will  cause  you  to  dwell  deep;  will  open  unto  you 
"divine  releases  from  the  common  ways,"  as  Plato 
would  put  it.  You  are  called  to  be  great.  We  will 
multiply  your  dangers  sevenfold,  and  your  joys  sev- 
enty and  sevenfold.  Your  cup  shall  run  over  both 
with  honey  and  with  gall  of  travail.  Lord  God 
will  pump  his  redder  blood  into  your  veins.  And 
redeem  your  life  from  nonentity.  He  will  give  you 
spunk.  So  that  you  may  stand  for  something.  We 
are  plotting  a  kingdom  of  God  upon  earth.  And 
the  evil  tyranny  of  the  powers  of  this  earth  will 
gnash  teeth  against  us.  But  we  are  not  dismayed. 
We  make  our  face  strong  against  their  face,  and 
our  forehead  firm  against  their  forehead.  It  is 
more  excellent  to  give  one's  life  for  freedom,  and 
enter  gloriously  the  congregation  of  the  dead,  tlian 
to  prolong  one's  days  in  abject  and  crouching  servi- 
tude. 

TO  THE  PROTESTANTS 

Some  three  years  ago  in  New  York,  Father 
Vaughn  on  successive  Sunday  mornings  was  un- 
limbering  his  guns  from  St.  Patrick's  cathedral, 
against  Socialism.     About  that  time  Bishop  Lines 

32 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

of  the  Episcopal  diocese  of  Newark  addressed  a 
meeting  of  young  Episcopal  ministers  in  New  York. 
And  said :  Gentlemen,  if  I  were  you  I  wouldn't 
fight  Socialism.  If  I  have  any  vision  of  the  future, 
the  line  of  cleavage  in  days  to  come  will  be,  Roman- 
ism and  property  rights,  versus  Socialism  and 
human  rights.  When  that  line  up  comes.  Protes- 
tantism will  probably  find  her  historic  tradition  ful- 
filled by  taking  sides,  not  with  Romanism  and  prop- 
erty rights  but  with  Socialism  and  human  rights. 

Mammon,  O  backsliding  Protestant  pulpit,  is 
not  your  friend.  It  is  the  day  of  riches.  Is  it  also 
a  day  of  god?  Never  before  was  materialism  so 
insolent.  Never  before  was  spirituality  so  impotent. 
There  is  in  the  people  a  paralysis  of  the  sense  of 
God.  The  Lord  has  forsaken  the  earth,  they  de- 
clare. Life's  finer  energy  is  chilled.  The  inner  life 
is  starved.    The  bright  lights  of  heaven  are  dimmed. 

I  know.  You  are  going  to  point  me  to  gifts 
bestowed  through  your  channels,  a  dazzling  philan- 
thropy. Eyes  that  discern  are  not  glamoured  by 
dazzling  philanthropy.  Freedom  is  more  than 
alms-giving;  and  self-respect  in  the  people,  than  a 
multitude  of  charities.  With  the  moneys  of  the 
rich  you  are  pauperizing  the  souls  of  the  poor.    Re- 

33 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

call  to  your  mind  the  eras  of  magnificent  decadence 
— a  world  externally  garnished,  but  within,  all  de- 
livered up  to  death.  I  have  searched  the  chambers 
of  my  imagery,  I  have  likened  this  age  to  a  harlot. 
Though  she  deck  her  with  ornaments  of  gold  and 
daub  with  rouge,  yet  she  is  a  harlot;  under  whose 
fair-seeming  surface,  decay  is  festering  and  much 
foulness. 

The  hell  beneath,  so  thinly  veneered  by  civilized 
make-believe,  now  is  bursting  through.  We  wit- 
ness a  world-conflagration.  And  the  white  angels 
of  Europe  are  being  destroyed  at  the  cannon's 
mouth.  O,  you  hang  your  head  down  to  the  ground, 
now.  And  you  do  well.  This  war  is  your  work. 
O  churches  of  Christendom.  Softly  now.  I'll  put 
it  as  tenderly  as  can  be.  But  the  firmament  above 
is  uttering  its  voice.  And  we  may  not  diminish  a 
word  of  it. 

You  have  taught  strife  instead  of  peace  as  the 
organizing  principle  of  industry  and  commerce. 
Competition  is  the  pleasant  sounding  word  where- 
with you  cover  it.  But  in  your  heart  you  know  it  is 
but  another  term  for  war.  Competitive  armaments 
are  the  outgrowth  of  competitive  merchandizings. 
When  trade  rivalries  face  each  other  across  fron- 

34 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

tiers,  the  professional  soldier  is  inevitable.  Dis- 
cern the  thing  aright,  I  entreat  you ;  sweep  the  cob- 
webs from  the  brain.  When  business  is  a  battle- 
field, the  battlefield  will  be  a  business.  To  such  an 
ordering  of  the  world's  business  life,  you  have 
given  your  sanctifying  consent.  So  that  now — 
myriad  men-at-arms;  a  tide  of  horsemen  like  the 
swelling  of  the  sea;  and  guns  big  and  many,  sound- 
ing a  devil's  tattoo. 

Radicalism  is  the  accusation  you  publish  against 
us.  We  accept  the  word.  Radical  means,  root- 
work.  We  lay  the  adze  at  the  root  of  the  tree. 
We  take  the  Carpenter  seriously,  holding  that  fel- 
lowship is  practical  in  the  affairs  of  earth.  The 
red  god  of  Galilee  is  our  leader.  We  decree  broth- 
erhood. We  shall  give  to  the  human  race  one  heart. 
You  sneer,  O,  I  know.  As  we  go  into  the  mud- 
gutter,  singing  the  commonwealth  and  uttering  our 
voice  to  the  mob,  you  sit  in  the  assembly  of  the 
mockers.  Generous  enthusiasms  are  "bad  taste" ; 
all  the  fine  exhuberance  and  adventure  of  the  soul 
are  placed  under  your  social  taboo.  O,  Respectabil- 
ity, what  crimes  are  committed  in  thy  name!  But 
we  account  your  scoffings  as  a  thing  of  naught.  We 
are  the  only  Christians  left.     Of  the  Most  High 

35 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

we  are  a  faithful  ambassador.  We  announce  for 
earth  a  new  dispensation,  all  vital  with  the  power 
from  above.  Long  have  his  mutterings  been  heard. 
Now  he  will  be  no  more  dumb.  There  is  shouting 
in  heaven  because  of  us.  We  are  the  place  where 
his  name  and  his  honor  dwell. 

Brother,  you've  got  to  think  hard.  And  you've 
got  to  think  fast.  Your  efforts  at  present  to  catch 
up  with  the  modern  mind,  are  as  a  glacier  in  a  foot- 
race with  an  avalanche.  So  low  has  spirituality  de- 
clined, that  multitudes  are  saying:  God  is  ahead; 
force  now  is  the  only  deity;  money  is  force;  there- 
fore get  money.  Marriage  is  penalized.  Only  the 
well-to-do  can  now  afford  a  wife  and  children — to 
the  abnormalizing  of  the  sex-life  in  a  thousand 
thousand.  Competition's  iron  law  is  smashing  the 
business  men  that  are  gentle  and  kindly ;  so  that  the 
good-hearted  are  ready  to  perish  from  the  earth; 
for  in  a  regime  of  claws  and  teeth,  only  the  wolfish 
possess  survival  value.  Greedy  of  gain  the  earth 
has  backslid  from  love  and  romance  and  gracious 
beauty.  The  toilers  have  slumped  into  a  generation 
of  hirelings.  Their  labors  are  in  the  house  of  a 
stranger.  They  go  to  their  work  with  a  slack 
hand.     Therefore  they  seek  the  dreamshop  where 

36 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

open  to  them  the  floodgates  of  obHvion;  they  fol- 
low after  drugs  that  give  dreams  in  the  daylight. 
The  while  you  motor-ride  with  rich  ones,  and 
stretch  your  feet  under  their  dining-table.  You 
have  never  descended  into  hell  with  the  miserables 
of  earth.    How  then  shall  you  be  their  deliverer? 

Great  is  the  age,  and  needs  a  great  religion. 
Christianity  in  the  modern  world  is  a  rowboat's  rud- 
der on  an  ocean  liner;  the  engine  is  out  of  all  pro- 
portion to  the  steering  gear.  Of  the  things  taught 
in  divinity  schools,  one-third  are  untrue,  and  one- 
third  are  irrelevant.  It  were  as  easy  to  rewrite 
Israel's  wilderness  journey  in  terms  of  the  telegraph 
and  vestibuled  trains,  as  to  hope  to  interpret  indus- 
trial democrary  in  the  formulae  of  the  Nicene  or 
Apostle's  creed.  The  clerical  mind,  in  this  stupend- 
ous modernity,  give  one  the  impression  of  the  sail- 
ing master  of  a  fifteenth  century  caravel  who 
should  awake  from  a  five-centuried  sleep  to  find 
himself  on  the  bridge  of  a  "Vaterland"  or  "Mau- 
retania,"  and  be  expected  to  take  charge  of  the 
vessel. 

You  have  brought  the  world  into  darkness  and 
not  into  light.  Yes  you,  O  pulpits  of  a  nineteenth- 
centuried  establishment.     The  darkening  sky,  and 

37 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

a  Europe  delivered  to  violence  and  spoil,  testify 
against  you.  From  you  should  have  gone  forth 
the  word  restraining  the  shedders  of  blood — the 
shedders  of  blood  in  both  the  business  area  and 
the  battle  area. 

But  the  word  came  not.  Thus  there  has  been 
no  collective  conscience.  The  world  has  been  be- 
reft of  moral  leadership.  Every  man's  hand  is 
against  his  brother.  This  blasphemy  you  now  have 
made  of  it,  whereby  blood  is  sent  into  the  streets, 
is  because  of  the  sin  you  have  sinned.  If  we,  the 
red  host,  had  been  in  control  of  the  earth,  and 
had  brought  things  to  such  a  muddle,  right  promptly  } 
you  would  cast  it  into  our  teeth.  Get  under  your 
burden  of  guilt,  then.  A  burden,  the  greater,  in  that 
you  have  stayed  our  hand.  When  we  have  pleaded 
for  a  world  order  in  place  of  the  present  disorder, 
and  have  sought  to  awaken  man  from  the  bad  dream 
he  is  dreaming,  you  have  dragged  us  to  arrest ;  have 
wounded  us  with  the  wound  of  an  enemy.  The  one 
thing  Christendom  resents  is  Christianity. 

"What  then  shall  we  do?"    I  will  tell  you  what  j 
to  do.     Transform  your  churches  into  churches  of 
the  social  revolution.     This  world,  inferno-centric, 
must  become  deocentric ;  fellowship  taking  the  place 

38 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

of  competition  in  our  merchandizings,  our  indus- 
trializings,  in  all  the  work  of  our  hands  and  in  the 
devisings  of  the  heart.  A  right-about-face,  that. 
A  chinacteric  change,  and  very  convulsing  to 
those  who  deemed  the  present  ordering  settled  on 
everlasting  foundations.  But  the  change  must  be. 
Topsy-turydom  shall  be  turned  right  side  up,  though 
many  the  while  eat  their  bread  with  quaking  and 
drink  the  water  of  trembling. 

TO  THE  JEW 

To-day  is  for  Judaism  a  crucial  hour.  She  is 
parting  with  her  ancient  faith,  and  has  found  not 
the  new.  Her  ghetto  days  are  past.  Past  likewise, 
rabbinical  lore;  the  talmud  and  its  mustiness;  the 
wearisome  feast;  Saturday's  Sabbath;  the  syna- 
gogue with  a  moth-eaten  ritual.  Her  oncetime  gar- 
ment has  fallen  from  her.  And  the  new  is  wanting. 
Naked  is  her  condition.  And  all  exposed,  like  a 
snake  that  has  sloughed  off  its  old  skin  before  a 
new  integument  has  grown. 

In  these  straits  some  of  her  children,  dead  to 
the  Israel  inspirations,  are  letting  go  their  spiritual 
anchorage,  to  grow  a  sheer  money-getting  set  of 
brains.    They  are  waxing  rich,  so  strong  is  the  racial 

39 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

fibre,  their  inheritance.  But  they  are  not  waxing 
noble.  A  Jew  fattening  in  green  pasture  is  not  a 
majestic  spectacle.  An  Israel  sleek  and  greedy  of 
dividends,  is  a  thing  despised  of  the  earth ;  and  the 
reproach  of  men. 

Judah  was  not  created  for  riches,  but  for 
righteousness.  Aspiration  is  the  stuff  of  which 
she  is  compounded.  An  aspiration,  moreover,  con- 
cerned with  things  industrial.  In  brickyards  of 
Goshen  was  her  nativity.  From  which  day,  a  para- 
dise for  the  toiler  has  been  her  essential  truth  and 
hope. 

The  Revolution  Church  is  the  blossoming  of 
Israel's  long  era  of  obscure  seed-sowings.  We  re- 
veal her  unto  herself.  We  are  a  twentieth-century 
version  of  the  Bible,  that  book  of  the  Hebrew  spirit, 
both  whose  old  and  new  testaments  were  written 
or  spoken  by  a  Jew.  This  Bible,  as  reinterpreted 
by  critical  scholarship,  is  our  text  book.  And  all 
the  world  shall  be  a  palestine  of  the  hovering  halo. 

Enter,  O  Israel,  into  our  fellowship.  Here,  los- 
ing your  Judaism  you  shall  find  it.  We  are  the 
accomplishment  of  the  vision  which  you  prophets 
foresaw  of  old.     A  spiritualized  Socialism  shall  be 

40 


I 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

the  Messiah,   for  whose  coming  immemorial  ages 
have  groaned. 

TO  THE  IDEALISTS 

Seekers  after  the  ideal,  the  Church  of  the  Revo- 
lution is  what  you  have  been  in  quest  of.  To-day 
your  soul  is  without  a  home.  The  accepted  churches 
are  stifling  to  you,  and  their  outworn  creeds  a  de- 
rision. But  the  other  extreme,  the  worldling's 
world,  is  likewise  not  for  you.  The  pettiness  and 
soullessness  of  it  revulse  you.  Its  mirth  is  hollow, 
as  that  of  one  charged  up  with  cocaine.  You  are 
a  scattered  sheep. 

Idealists  require  an  outer  union.  The  Revolu- 
tion Church  gathers  up  them  that  are  wandering; 
to  the  end  that  their  diverging  energies  may  coalesce 
in  the  might  of  mass  action.  Fine  is  the  dream  you 
are  dreaming;  and  needs  now  to  incarnate  itself. 
Let  idealism  be  married  to  action,  the  womb  of  time 
swells  big  with  destiny;  and  a  new  era  is  gestated 
that  shall  change  the  mental  map.  Always,  when 
religion  and  economics  get  together,  history  dips 
her  pen  afresh  and  writes  a  thundering  chapter. 

We  are  spiritually  your  kith  and  kin.  You  are 
unmagnetized  by  a  religion  whose  absorbing  con- 

41 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

cern  is  harp  music  in  the  hereafter.  Your  intelli- 
gence craves  a  here-and-now  heaven.  The  paradise 
we  are  preparing  has  foundations.  We  are  do- 
dreamers;  purposing  to  live  our  idealism  and  not 
merely  talk  it.  Head  and  shoulders  are  in  cloud- 
land.  But  the  feet  are  flatly  on  the  good  brown 
earth. 

Hard  idealists  are  we.  Our  tribe  fights  not  as 
one  that  beats  the  air.  We  have  enemies  of  a  very 
strong  flesh  and  blood.  We  are  lifters  up  of  the 
lowly.  Wherefore  we  are  gnashed  upon  by  the 
class  that  is  extortionately  heaping  up  great  rev- 
enues. A  spirituality  that  has  no  punch  to  it,  is  a 
spiritless  thing.  We  invite  you  to  join  yourself  to 
us.  But  we  promise  you  no  easy  time.  There  are 
battles  to  fight.  We  rescue  the  spoiled  from  the 
oppressor.  Democracy  is  a  warfare,  and  demands 
in  its  devotees  a  breed,  a  disposition  stout  and  most 
warrior-like.  The  evils  under  which  our  liberties 
groan  are  not  by  accident.  The  world  is  wrong- 
side-up-with-care.  Great  lords  with  selfishness 
aforethought  have  barricaded  the  road  that  leads  to 
freedom.  And  will  not  be  moved  save  by  a  force 
stronger  than  they. 

Our  flag  of  red  is  the  symbol  of  the  world's 
42 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

wrath  against  barbarism — the  new  barbarism  of 
the  power  of  money.  Our  unfolding  power  fortifies 
faith,  and  makes  ideahsm  once  more  credible.  Ex- 
cept under  us,  to  what  flag  will  you  rally  ?  Protest- 
antism is  a  spent  force.  Romanism  is  a  stiffest- 
necked  reactionary;  avowedly  an  institution  for 
organizing  the  world's  inertia.  That  we  of  the 
Revolution  Church  go  from  strength  to  strength 
is  the  hope  of  the  world.  We  alone  have  kept  the 
faith.  For  we  preach  deliverance  to  the  slaves,  and 
plead  the  causes  of  the  poor.  With  your  strength 
joined  to  ours,  we  shall  multiply  as  the  bud  of  the 
field,  and  prosper  into  an  everlasting  center  of  light, 

TO  THE  SINGLE  TAXER 

You  seek  to  alter  the  basis  of  land  ownership. 
And  therein  you  seek  wisely.  In  land  titles,  much 
iniquity  is  imbedded.  To  purge  the  injustice  would 
lift  a  grievous  load  from  the  backs  of  men.  Yes, 
the  social  reformers  of  all  schools,  have  values  of 
worth  in  their  programs.  We  shout  a  cheer  to  you. 
We  greet  you.     We  god-speed  you. 

But  do  you  not  discern  what  is  keeping  your  ef- 
forts from  fruitage.  You  have  a  splendid  engine; 
but  not  much  boiler  power.     Except  the  people  be 

43 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

vitalized  into  citizenship,  with  their  civic  responsi- 
biHties  alert,  the  best  conceived  programs  will  go 
abortive.  The  multitudes  are  asleep.  That  is  the 
commanding  crime  of  the  ages.  Before  it  all  cam- 
paigns of  betterment  go  down  in  dismal  defeat. 
Invent  new  forms  of  taxation ;  the  direct  primary ; 
the  intiative,  referendum,  recall.  What  you  will. 
Until  the  people  have  been  stirred  out  of  slumber, 
your  devisings  will  come  to  naught. 

Herein  our  Church  is  your  coadjutor.  Revolu- 
tion is  the  one  mightiest  folk  awakener.  The 
alarum  bell  of  it  may  be  of  iron ;  and  of  an  intona- 
tion hoarsely  uncivil.  But  it  causes  the  sleeper  to 
sit  up,  and  with  both  fists  to  rub  slumber  from  his 
eyelids.  No  ear  so  thick,  but  the  sound  waves 
penetrate.  No  brain  so  case-hardened,  but  the 
reverberation  beat  through.  Like  old  soil  caked 
beyond  what  plough  can  loosen,  and  needing  to  be 
blasted  before  it  will  open  to  seed-sowing;  so  are 
the  minds  of  the  multitude.  Revolution  breaks  up 
their  brain  surface,  time-incrusted  and  packed  by 
the  tramp  of  immemorial  oppressions.  The  up- 
heaval lets  in  the  sun  and  air;  brings  the  subsoil 
into  play ;  unseals  fertility  theretofore  unthought  of. 
'Tis  true,  the  concussion  may  break  a  few  windows. 

44 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

But  window  breakage  is  a  bargain  price  to  pay,  for 
fields  reclaimed  from  fallowness  and  added  to  the 
tillable  acreage. 

Revolution  is  the  soul's  restorative.  It  is  the 
fountain  of  the  world's  youth,  where  life  forever 
rejuvenesces.  Cases  are  authentically  established 
where  its  saving  strength  has  plucked  humanity's 
feet  from  hell.  Revolution  is  in  the  kingdom  of 
the  economic  what  romance  is  in  the  kingdom  of 
sex — the  replenisher  of  idealisms,  kindler  of  faith, 
revealer  of  God  to  man. 

Our  Church  is  the  angel  of  the  resurrection  to 
soul's  that  are  dead  in  comfort  and  civic  negligence. 
We  are  coupling  a  fervor  veritably  evangelistic, 
with  the  most  modern  social  idealism.  Herein  you, 
O  single  taxer,  are  of  like  spirit  with  us.  "Prog- 
ress and  Poverty"  was  more  a  contribution  to  the 
life  spiritual  than  to  the  life  economic.  It  was  a 
great  book  because  greatly  religious.  We  justify 
a  fanatical  state  of  intensity  in  the  soul.  And  then 
we  hitch  this  restive  and  pawing  enthusiasm  onto 
the  lumbering  vehicle  of  social  reform.  The  sancti- 
fication  of  the  civic  is  the  task  to  which  we  have 
engaged  our  heart.  The  Church  of  the  Social  Revo- 
lution invites  you,  O  deviser  of  beneficent  reforms. 

45 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

In  recompense  she  will  bring  to  pass  the  purpose 
your  mind  has  conceived  and  unto  which  your  spirit 
is  so  singly  and  so  signally  intent. 

TO  THE  IDLER 

To  the  Socialist  our  Church  has  uttered  its 
voice;  to  the  Trade-unionist  likewise;  the  I.  W.  W. ; 
the  Protestant ;  the  middleclass ;  the  Jew ;  the  ideal- 
ist; and  the  social  reformer.  With  one  other 
group  we  speak — the  idler  class. 

What  manner  of  words  shall  we  address  to  you, 
indolent  one,  sitting  in  the  sun?  Kindly  words? 
But  you  are  living  off  the  labors  of  another.  How 
shall  one  speak  in  kindly  words  with  such.  You 
are  on  another's  back  whose  one  pair  of  legs  must 
carry  his  weight  and  yours.  You  ask:  "Wherein 
am  I  on  another's  back?"  In  that  you  consume 
without  producing.  That  is  the  iniquity  of  your  sin, 
and  the  great  transgression.  Whatsoever  you  eat, 
whatsoever  you  use,  is  of  the  sweat  of  somebody's 
brow.  You  neither  toil  nor  spin.  Yet  you  feed 
delicately.  And  are  clothed  as  Solomon  never  was. 
You  suck  the  arterial  blood  of  the  poor.  The  per- 
sons of  men  are  your  merchandise.  You  eat  our 
harvest.      You   spend   up   the   toil   of   our   hands. 

46 


J 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

With  the  wares  of  our  making  your  house  filled. 
You  are  of  gentle  carriage.  But  in  the  person  of 
your  rent  collector  and  agents  you  do  after  the 
manner  of  all  the  destroyers  that  ever  afflicted  and 
cumbered  the  earth. 

For  an  able-bodied  man  or  woman  to  live  with- 
out work,  is  an  ignobility  for  whose  reproof  some 
form  of  pillory  or  stocks  or  ducking  stool  will  have 
to  be  devised.  Such  a  one  disgraces  the  mother  who 
bore  him,  the  father  that  bred  him,  and  the  social 
system  that  tolerates  him.  If  you  are  of  such,  my 
brother,  and  are  of  set  mind  to  remain  such,  then 
on  you  the  Revolution  Church  opens  war.  The 
thoughts  that  we  think  towards  you  are  thoughts  of 
menace  and  not  of  amity.  We  teach  rebellion 
against  you.  Your  anger  will  be  kindled.  But  we 
have  purposed  it,  and  will  not  turn  back  from  it. 
Our  bearing  toward  you  is  super-altruism — the  lov- 
ing kindness  of  a  surgeon  who  cuts  a  wen  from 
your  neck  with  a  knife  very  strong  and  sharp. 
Despite  your  clean  linen,  your  person  so  tubbed  and 
groomed  and  faultless,  there  is  about  you  a  squint 
of  the  cannibal.  The  marrow  of  men  is  your  food. 
And  their  sweat  is  the  wine  you  drink.  Therefore 
between  us  and  you  we  build  a  wall  of  demarcation. 

47 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

We  put  enmity  between  a  slave  and  his  master. 
Time  out  of  mind,  the  attempt  has  been  to  persuade 
rich  men  from  their  riches.  The  ancient  authors 
are  full  of  it.  With  sincerity,  and  ofttimes  an 
excellent  eloquence,  they  preach  the  deceit  of 
riches,  the  inquietudes  that  go  with  much  gold,  the 
hallowness  of  the  satisfaction  afforded  by  it.  It 
has  been  the  theme  of  poets.  The  discourse  of 
philosophers.  Topic  perrenial  of  platform  oratory. 
Yet  it  is  doubtful  if  it  ever  made  a  single  convert, 
or  deterred  one  man  from  the  gilded  path.  The 
idler  will  not  of  his  own  volition  get  off  the  toiler's 
back.  The  toiler  must  shake  him  off.  A  business, 
moreover,  salutary  to  both  the  shaker  and  the 
shaked. 

You  have  passed  the  time  appointed,  brother. 
In  array  against  you  are  the  stars  in  their  courses, 
the  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution,  and  God  the 
Eternal.  We  of  the  fellowship  host  already  are  not 
few.  Like  a  flood  we  are  coming  up.  We  shall 
cover  the  earth.  Your  silver  and  your  gold  shall 
not  be  able  to  deliver  you.  In  a  work-universe  you 
are  workless.  You  are  dainty;  are  very  exacting 
of  life.  You  teach  the  infernal  code  that  women  and 
children  must  walk  the  treadmill,  that  you  may  live 

48 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

at  ease.  Therefore  we  set  against  you  from  every 
side.  As  the  noise  of  a  host  we  are  gathering  our- 
selves. We  shall  mar  your  pride.  And  bid  you 
come  down  from  your  glory. 

Be  advised.  The  one  thing  a  swollen  fortune 
may  righteously  do,  is  to  dedicate  itself  to  revolu- 
tionary propaganda,  in  order  that  swollen  fortunes 
thereafter  may  be  impossible.  The  Revolution 
Church  offers  its  hand,  to  lead  you  in  the  more  ex- 
cellent way.  With  us,  earning  what  you  consume, 
you  shall  eat  the  bread  of  self-respect ;  and  it  shall 
be  as  honey  for  sweetness.  Taste  and  see  that  com- 
radeship is  above  rubies.  So  shall  you  be  pure  from 
extortion,  that  brutalizes  the  soul.  You  shall  see 
that  hand  joined  in  equal  hand  rejoices  the  soul 
more  than  men-servants;  and  neighborliness,  than 
the  pomp  of  a  rich  house. 

A  WORLD  BLEEDING  TO  DEATH 

While  the  above  has  been  writing  the  world 
war  has  been  progressing.  Most  of  my  time  has 
been  in  manual  labor,  leaving  only  snatched 
moments  of  daylight  in  my  cell  for  pen  work.  So 
that  to  pen  these  sheets  has  taken  me  more  than  a 
month.     During  which  time  the  crisis  for  civiliza- 

49 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

Hon  has  progressively  darkened.  And  is  glooming 
now  into  a  climax  of  horror.  This  present  order 
of  society  is  bleeding  to  death.  Killing  by  machin- 
ery is  doing  its  proper  work.  Yes,  has  already  done 
it.  The  mortal  wound  has  been  dealt.  Whether 
peace  comes  soon,  now  is  an  indifferent  thing.  The 
veins  have  been  opened.  And  are  pouring  out  life's 
liquor  beyond  surgery  to  staunch.  Reports  come 
in  to  the  prison  here,  that  humanitarian  souls  are 
organizing  peace  parades.  And  concerted  prayers. 
But  the  armies  clash  ever  more  bloodily.  Rival 
navies,  too,  unloose  their  fearful  blood-lettings;  so 
that  there  is  sorrow  on  the  sea.  It  cannot  be  quiet. 
As  though  the  devils  of  war  could  be  exercised  by 
sentimentalisms  howsoever  pious.  War  is  not  a 
local  sore  on  the  body  human.  It  is  a  disease  of 
the  tissues  and  nerves  and  brain  and  circulatory 
fluid.  It  will  not  yield  except  by  an  alterative  that 
shall  change  the  system  totally. 

There  needs  a  new  temper  in  the  world's  work. 
We  behold  an  unevangelized  commerce;  an  unevan- 
gelized  statecraft.  It  is  the  organized  ethics  of 
barbarism.  In  themselves,  these  have  a  harmless 
look.  But  in  the  end  they  bite  with  a  serpent's  bite 
and  sting  like  an  adder.     Many  have  been  deceived 

50 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

by  the  seedling  whilst  it  was  young  and  tender-look- 
ing. Now,  however,  it  has  come  to  its  bloom  in  the 
red  blossoms  of  battle.  And  the  most  unimaginative 
perceives  it  a  plant  poisonous  and  dripping  with 
bane. 

The  wise  men  of  the  nations  meet  in  peace  con- 
gresses. To  heal  the  sick  earth,  they  use  many 
medicines.  And  marvel  at  their  want  of  success. 
War  is  a  boil  on  the  world's  body.  And  indicates 
that  the  blood  is  sick.  The  more  boils,  the  more 
sickness  of  the  blood.  At  this  moment  the  world 
is  boils  from  the  crown  of  its  head  to  the  sole  of 
its  feet.  Cure  this  thing  with  peace  parades  ?  One 
might  as  well  try  to  cure  fever  sores  with  ham  rine. 

And  the  patient  is  going  to  get  sicker.  The 
bad  to-day  will  give  place  to  a  worse  to-morrow. 
World  war  is  competition's  combination.  This 
teeth-and-toe-nails  civilization  is  one  continuing 
warfare.  A  military  clash  is  but  the  long  commer- 
cial clash  come  to  a  head.  Christendom  has  fol- 
lowed after  the  gods  of  economic  greed.  She  has 
sown  thistles  and  briers.  And  now,  as  the  crop,  a 
forest  of  bayonets,  and  lances  pricking  the  land- 
scape. 

And  will  be.  War  is  growing  ever  more  fiend- 
Si 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

ish.  Almost  may  "civilization"  be  defined  as  a 
heightened  warfare  over  the  dull  combats  of  sav- 
agery. Christendom  displays  its  superiority  over 
the  uncivilized  portions  of  the  globe,  by  a  war  such 
as  Mohammedans  or  Hindoos  could  never  have  ex- 
hibited. Murder  machines  are  the  crowning  dis- 
covery of  the  age.  With  vast  pains,  melinite  and 
lyddite  have  been  invented,  and  slaughter  weapons 
skilful  to  destroy.  The  devil  has  learned  of  late 
to  deal  destruction  from  the  sky.  In  the  heavens, 
in  the  earth,  and  in  the  waters  under  the  earth,  man 
has  contrived  against  himself  ingenious  damnation. 
It  almost  seems  as  if  "civilization"  had  a  subcon- 
scious feeling  of  her  unworthiness  to  continue — a 
feeling  implanted  by  the  Overruler?  Who  shall 
say? — and  therefore  has  devised  wonderful  con- 
trivances of  self-destruction. 

America  thinks  to  be  spared  a  visit  of  the 
destroying  angel.  Sundered  from  the  war  area  by 
an  ocean's  width,  she  laughs  Aha.  And  merrily 
annexes  the  trade  territories  of  them  that  are  now 
at  combat.  But  let  her  not  think  to  escape.  Aggres- 
sion into  the  markets  of  men,  unchains  the  martial 
madness  of  men.  If  America  waxes  rich,  and 
Europe  poor,  a  flame  will  there  kindle  against  her. 

52 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

Europe,  now  split,  will  be  welded  in  the  heat  of  a 
common  indignation,  and  a  common  fear.  Navies 
will  converge  on  her  from  many  parts,  and  America 
will  also  become  a  land  whose  first  and  principle 
business  is  warfare. 

The  Atlantic  now  is  shrunk  to  what  the  North 
Sea  was  in  the  ante-steamship  era.  The  North  Sea 
in  that  day  permitted  the  flames  of  war  easily  to 
overleap  it.  Let  America  continue  her  idolatry  of 
the  dollar,  she  will  very  soon  have  need  of  guns  on 
her  sea  wall,  as  pickets  on  a  fence  for  multitude. 
She  will  not  say  Aha,  in  that  day  when  militarism 
has  saddled  a  soldier  on  her  every  workingman's 
back.  She  too  will  drink  of  the  cup;  the  cup  large 
and  deep.    It  holds  much. 

CHURCH  OF  THE  REVOLUTION,  THE 
LIGHT  OF  THE  WORLD 

We  look  forth  on  a  rocking  world;  destruction 
upon  destruction;  so  that  the  earth  mourns  and 
the  heavens  above  are  black.  Is  there  then  no  hope? 
Yes.  The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution  has 
come  up  in  the  fulness  of  time.  Earth  is  a  gam- 
bler's wheel,  and  in  the  circle  of  the  years  has  spun 
around  at  last  to  the  right  number.     In  bitterness 

53 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

and  blood,  the  old  order  wherein  man  has  lived  until 
now,  consumes  a  way.  Its  days  are  fulfilled.  Its 
end  has  come. 

Our  Church  is  a  foreordination.  In  this  black 
and  dark  night  we  are  fashioning  a  world-order  to 
take  the  place  of  this  world-chaos.  We  are  creating 
a  new  thing  in  the  earth,  a  race  that  shall  rejoice  in 
fellowship  as  misers  in  their  gold,  as  a  drunkard 
in  his  cups.  Imposible  to  change  human  nature? 
To  achieve  the  impossible,  has  the  Revolution 
Church  been  born.  In  our  singing  you  will  detect 
a  joyousness  to  tingle  the  ears  of  the  eternal.  Oft- 
times,  impoverished,  yet  we  are  rewarded  with  a 
more  pleasant  and  precious  riches.  Obscurity, 
houndings,  imprisonment,  find  us  to  be  comrades 
knit  for  adversity.  A  corpus  christi  are  we,  to  get 
the  hell  out  of  this  earth  and  let  a  little  of  heaven  in. 

We  are  girding  a  belt  of  brotherhood  around  the 
world;  for  our  goings  forth  are  to  the  ends  of  the 
earth.  Nevertheless  we  attack  not  the  principle  of 
nationality.  We  decree  a  world  of  nations  dwelling 
securely  without  armament;  frontiers  unfortified, 
yet  inviolate.  Man  shall  not  be  alien  from  man,  as 
now.  We  are  making  him  a  new  heart  and  a  new 
spirit. 

54 


Its  Message  to  the  World 

There  shall  be  no  folk  of  the  common  sort. 
Our  God  has  grace  enough  to  make  every  man  a 
nobleman,  and  every  woman  beautiful.  The  ofif- 
scouring  and  the  refuse  shall  have  inheritance  with 
us.  Bad  are  the  pains  of  poverty.  Bad,  the  ennui 
of  riches.  Both  shall  be  done  away.  We  exalt  the 
laborer,  and  abase  the  leisurist.  The  producer  shall 
not  as  now  bring  his  neck  under  the  yoke  of  an  own- 
ing class.  In  gladness  shall  he  create,  and  seek  his 
immortality  in  that  which  his  hands  have  wrought. 
The  toiler  shall  eat  and  be  satisfied.  But  idler,  be 
they  in  rags,  be  they  in  tags,  be  they  in  velvet  gowns, 
shall  have  hunger  of  bread.  The  craftsman  shall  be 
in  great  praise.  Honor  and  majesty  shall  be  laid 
upon  him.  Man  shall  not  labor  to  be  rich.  Man 
shall  labor  to  be  creative.  And  earth  shall  be  quick- 
ened to  a  rebirth  in  beauty.  Beyond  all  conjecture 
is  the  sumptuousness  that  is  laid  up  for  earth,  when 
man  shall  have  dilated  to  the  dimensions  of  an  in- 
dustrial democrat. 

So  shall  the  world  go  wealthy.  The  fool  says, 
Wealth  is  commodities.  But  I  say,  the  only  wealth 
is  beauty.  A  land  may  have  things  in  all  profusion ; 
it  may  be  moral  as  Cato  or  Aristides ;  and  populous 
as  the  seashore  sand.    Lacking  beauty  it  is  a  pauper 

55 


The  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution 

land;  whose  name  shall  rot;  commonplaceness  shall 
name  them  for  its  own.  Taste  and  grace,  and 
harmony,  sweet  serenities  of  line,  a  refined  and  col- 
orful handiwork,  vision  for  the  eye,  and  melody  for 
the  ear;  in  a  word,  all  that  makes  for  art  and  that 
brings  it  home  into  the  folk  life — these  are  more  to 
be  desired  than  gold.  They  are  the  true  riches. 
Beauty  is  the  crown  and  excellency  of  life,  for 
which  all  else  is  raw  material,  and  without  which, 
possessions  are  a  perishable  nothingness. 

With  a  plea  for  beauty,  then,  this  message  takes 
leave  of  you.  It  has  brought  you  by  now  to  see  that 
the  Church  of  the  Social  Revolution  is  not  a  disin- 
tegrator. We  are  pathmakers  preparing  a  way  for 
mankind  when,  from  its  orgy  of  blood,  it  awakes  in 
a  bewildering  tomorrow.  With  one  hand  we  tear 
down  and  pluck  up.  For  the  religion  of  dogma,  we 
give  the  religion  of  democracy.  For  superstition, 
we  give  science.  For  the  creeds,  we  give  Carpenter, 
cornerstone  of  romance  and  divine  adventure.  For 
war,  we  give  the  pure,  the  gracious,  the  plentiful  arts 
of  peace.  And  God,  Friend  of  Freedom,  shall  be 
prince  forever. 

BOUCK  WHITE. 


56 


I 


A  Book  Charged  With  the  Noblest  Power 

"The  Call  of  the  Carpenter"  is  the  first  and  only  book  which  gives  a  true  inter- 
pretation of  Jesus  and  his  monumenial  service  to  humanity.  Bouck  White  has  cleared 
away  the  rubbish  with  ruthless  hand,  removing  the  theological  disguise,  and  re- 
vealing to  us  in  palpitant  flesh  and  blood  the  grand  Galilean  proletaire  who  was  foully 
murdered  by  the  Roman  Empire  twenty  centuries  ago.  In  a  symposium  to  "Life" 
recently,  to  which  I  was  asked  to  contribute,  I  named  Bouck  White's  "Call  of  the 
Carpenter"  as  the  greatest  book  I  had  read  since  "Les  Miserables."  I  had  a  copy 
of  it  sent  to  George  D.  Herron,  who  is  now  in  Italy^  I  have  just  received  a  letter 
from,  him  giving  his  estimate  of  the  work: 

"I  cannot  thank  you  enough  for  sending  me  "The  Call 
of  the  Carpenter.'  It  is  difficult  to  speak  of  the  book  with- 
out beginning  at  once  with  superlatives.  It  is  the  most 
dynamic  and  efficient  interpretation  of  Jesus  that  has  ever 
been  written.  It  is  a  book  that  will  as  assuredly  be  one  of 
the  makers  of  history  as  was  Rousseau's  'Social  Contract.' 
Get  it  as  widely  as  possible  into  the  middle-class  reading 
public.  The  book  is  a  tremendous  ally.  It  is  charged,  with 
the  deepest  and  noblest  revolutionary  power  and  efficiency. 
It  is  the  product  of  immense  brooding  and  vast  study. 
Its  writer  must  have  been  charged  with  the  true  heartache 
of  the  world." 

Jesus  belongs  to  the  working  class.  I  have  always  felt  that  he  was  my  friend 
and  comrade,  and  now  since  reading  Bouck  White's  book  I  know  it.  The  Roman 
Empire  stole  the  Carpenter,  after  it  crucified  him.  Bouck  White  has  tracked,  the 
robbers  step  by  step.  He  has  restored  Christ  to  the  world's  proletariat  in  which  he 
was  born,  and  whom  he  loved  and  served  without  the  shadow  of  turning  until  their 
enemies  spiked  him  to  the  cross.  I  thank  Bouck  White  with  all  my  heart  for  giving 
this  great   book   to  the   world. — Eugene   V.   Debs  in   "The   Coming  Nation,"   Chicago. 

Christianity  Took  Its  Rise  in  An  Economic  Upheaval 

Bouck  White's  "Call  of  the  Carpenter"  will  give  a  new  presentation  of  the  Divine 
Man.  The  spirit  of  this  book  holds  a  reverent  attitude  towards  Jesus.  We  are  told 
that  "He  belonged  to  what  is  now  known  as  the  tin-dinner-pail  crowd,."  The  idea 
here  is  the  simple  truth.  Bouck  White  sees  in  Jesus  the  man  of  the  calloused  hands; 
a  man  who  came  to  destroy  the  civilization  that  makes  the  millions  the  slaves  of 
the  few — came  to  establish  a  kingdom  that  should  be  the  brotherhood  of  humanity. 
But  this  brought  him  into  conflict  with  the  system.  And  this  system  put  him  forth- 
with to  death.  That  system  consisted  chiefly  of  Roman  Capitalists.  Rome  was  a 
gigantic  parasite;  a  hundred  million  were  in  penury  in  order  that  two  hundred 
thousand  might  revel  in  lust  and  luxury.  This  volume  shows  that  Jesus  is  rising 
more  and  more  clearly  into  the  world's  consciousness,  and  that  we  must  look  to  him 
for  our  light  and  leading  in  the  grim  life  problems  that  confront  us. 

— Edwin  Markhatn  in  New   York  American. 

The  Most  Interesting  Person  in  History 

This  is  a  book  which  everyone  interested  in  the  religion  of  Christ  should  read 
in  order  to  get  a  correct  idea  of  the  gospel.  It  aims  to  make  Jesus  the  most  in- 
teresting person  in  history,  in  which  it  is  a  great  success.  A  new  interpretation  of 
the  life  of  Jesus,  an  interpretation  reverent,  yet  most  daring  and  revolutionary.  It 
is  a  trumpet  call  to  the  leaders  of  ChristianitX'  to  study  anew  the  life  of  the  Car- 
penter of  Nazareth. — Atlanta  Constitution. 

Based  on  Sound  Scholarship 

"The  Carpenter  and  the  Rich  Man,"  with  which  Bouck  White  has  followed  his 
much  talked  of  "Call  of  the  Carpenter,"  is  likely  to  attract  as  much  attention  as 
the  earlier  book.  His  interesting  and  forceful  argument  is  that  Christ  was  far 
more  vigorous  and  militant  in  his  attitude  toward  wealth  than  he  has  been  repre- 
sented by  the  long-accepted  version  of  the  Bible  and  by  the  orthodox  expounding  of 
it.  He  pictures  a  Christ  less  meek.  T'he  interest  and  importance  of  this  repre- 
sentation depends  upon  the  fact  that  Bouck  White  has  been  an  actual  studerit  of 
the  higher  criticism  of  the  Bible  at  Union  Theological  Seminary  from  whiA  he 
g^raduated,;  and  that  he  holds  the  theological  schools  of  the  country,  and  those  pro- 
fessors and  ministers  who  teach  the  higher  criticism,  to  be  doing  more  than  any 
other   group  to  advance  the  social  revolution. — Springfield  Republican. 


i:i)e  Cfjurcf)  of  ti)e 
Social  Eebolution 

desires  missionaries  to  represent  it  and  sell  its  literature.  Si 
ment  is  expressing  itself  in  many  communities  for  this  religio 
valor  and  social  idealism.  A  clear  call  for  devotees  to  orga 
the  folk  upheaval  and  turn  the  times  to  fellowship. 

Books  by  Bouck  White,  preacher  of  the 
Gospel  of  the  Transfiguration  of  Labor: 

CALL  OF  THE  CARPENTER.     Cloth,  $1.20;  paper 

"Bouck  White  makes  this  study  of  Jesus  according  to  the  nu^t 
and  from  the  standpoint  now  commonly  used  in  the  study  oi 
other  of  the  great  figures  of  the  world.  That  is  to  say,  he  p 
Jesus  in  the  geographic,  historic  land  of  Galilee,  rather  than  in  a  g 
of  Galilean  clouds.  He  sets  him  in  the  midst  of  the  economic 
political  and  social  forces  of  Galilee  under  the  rule  of  Rome,  n 
than  in  an  exclusive  mystic  haze  of  miracle  and  religious  rap 
He  shows  the  workings  of  these  external  agencies  upon  the 
Jesus,  as  they  may  be  shown  to  affect  all  men.  He  traces  the 
of  this  workingman  of  Galilee  to  be  the  leader  of  workingmen,  oi 
the  same  qualities  that  make  for  leadership  in  the  present, 
effect  of  this  study  is  electrifying.  Jesus  emerges  from  the  shat 
of  a  falling  church  into  the  radiant  daylight.  He  becomes  a 
again,  a  workingman,  the  great  prototype  of  the  proletariat  U 
one  whose  manner  of  protest  against  tyranny  of  every  sort  i 
wise  and  efficacious  today  as  it  was  in  the  days  of  Tiberius  and  H 
the  Tetrarch.''— ff'a.y/n'»(7/ou  Star. 

THE  CARPENTER  AND  THE  RICH  MAN 

THE    MIXING 

Tale    of    a    Town    that    Found,    Itself.       Socialism    .\pplied    to    the    Country 
District. 

BOOK  OF  DANIEL  DREW 

A  Study   in   the   Psychology   of  Wall    Street. 

LETTERS  FROM  PRISON.     Cloth,  50c;  paper 

Socialism   a   Spiritual   Sunrise. 

MESSAGE  TO  THE  WORLD 

Twenty   copies   for 

SONGS  OF  THE  FELLOWSHIP  (words  and  music) 

IMMORALITY  OF  BEING  RICH 

IMBECILITY  OF  BEING  A  MILLIONAIRE 

THE  MEEK  PREPARING  TO  INHERIT  THE  EARTH..  .  . 

cAddress 

Church  of  the  Social   Revoluti 

165  WEST  23d    STREET  NEW  YORK  C 

POSTPAID 
THE  LiBKAi 

OJOVERSITr  OF  CA-:i  ukNJ>» 
LOS  ANGELES 


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Church  of  the 
"ocial  Revoluti- 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


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